Over the last two years, the task force reviewed and analysed "all of the empirical studies published in English in peer-reviewed journals since 1989 that compared the mental health of women who had an induced abortion to comparison groups of women, or that examined factors that predict mental health among women who have had an elective abortion in the United States". They found that, while some women do indeed experience negative feelings or suffer clinical depression after an abortion, there's nothing to suggest that such feelings are directly attributable to the abortion itself as opposed to other circumstances, like, say the 73% of abortion seekers who terminate because they can't afford a baby, for reasons ranging from unemployment to lack of healthcare to supporting the maximum number of dependents possible already. The report also notes that "women terminating a wanted pregnancy, who perceived pressure from others to terminate their pregnancy, or who perceived a need to keep their abortion secret from their family and friends because of stigma associated with abortion, were more likely to experience negative psychological reactions following abortion" – which suggests that fundamentalist religion might be a better indicator of post-abortion distress than abortion, ahem.

One of the most significant recurrent problems the task force identified was "serious methodological problems", like a failure to control for other obvious risk factors. In addition to the aforementioned poverty and social stigma, many of the previously completed studies that claimed causation between abortion and mental distress ignored relevant indicators such as domestic violence, preexistent emotional and/or psychological problems, former or current substance abuse, and prior unwanted births. The exclusion of such evident risk factors renders any conclusion so laughably absurd it's difficult to believe an ideological agenda was not at work. Because science certainly wasn't.

In 2005, I questioned on these same grounds a Norwegian study which purported to find that women who had abortions suffer "mental distress" longer than women who miscarry. It made the very mistakes which the APA task force found are endemic to studies examining abortion-related distress – and I daresay the problem is that, even within the scientific community (as everywhere else, including the US supreme court), the idea women inevitably suffer distress after an abortion is taken as self-evident; these studies are coming to a foregone conclusion.

Thing is, not all women do suffer distress after an abortion. Some women feel distress at a pregnancy, which is why they seek out abortions. Plenty of women surely feel a combination of sadness and relief after an abortion, given that, to my understanding, abortions don't eliminate the ability to hold two thoughts in one's head at the same time.

But it's really the women who feel no regret that seems to bother and confound us. There's not a strong cultural narrative for women who are equipped to carry a child but totally don't want to, irrespective of their reasons. Most discussions of abortion axiomatically regard pregnancy as something every woman wants and to which every woman will have a special connection, which is why so much legislation is designed with the presumption that women seeking abortions have had to deny the reality of being pregnant – that if only she sees it's a baby on an ultrasound … if only she hears the fetal heartbeat … if only she just thinks about what she's doing for 24 more hours …

To the women who seek abortions, the reality of being pregnant is not something they get an abortion in spite of. It is precisely what's driving them to seek the abortion in the first place.

Maybe if we could wrap our heads around that, we could finally wrap our heads around the idea that abortions do not cause mental distress to the women who get them.